Silver Fox
by karlalujah
Summary: This is how Lisa Cuddy sleeps with her father's best friend-or should it be the other way around?
1. Lessons

**Title:** Silver Fox

**Characters:** Lisa Cuddy, and some OCs

**Rating:** R

**Synopsis:** This is how Lisa Cuddy sleeps with her father's best friend-or should it be the other way around?

**Author's Note:** Inspired by Woody Allen's 'Manhattan' and the revelation that Cuddy did, in fact, sleep with her father's best friend, I decided to freely interpret this in one story.

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**Part I: Lessons**

"The meal was exquisite. Thank you so much, Arlene. Cal, I'll see you in the weekend at the driving range."

After nearly two hours of dinner, wine, coffee, and cakes, a sated Roger Bateman forced himself to stand up, stretch, and exchange pleasantries with the Cuddy family. It had been a long day, and both he and Cal, best friend and colleague, were tired. He felt a hand tug at his gray suit. _Of course._ He had to get his June home for her homework. There was that, too.

Cal stifled a yawn and put an arm around his wife. "Sure. Take care of Daddy, Junie." Thank god for these Bateman-Cuddy dinners. It was almost impossible not to have the man at his home every two weeks.

"Glad you liked your dinner and your dessert. Hopefully, June would walk the slices of cake off. I almost didn't get them right because of Lisa's—"

"Yes. _Thank you, mom_. Good night, June. And don't worry about mother. She was just kidding arou—"

"You know I never kid, dear. I was just pointing out that—" Cal squeezed his wife's arm and gave her The Look. That finally made Arlene Cuddy, housewife extraordinaire, shut up. Roger chuckled at Arlene's guilelessness. There would never be a dull moment at the Cuddy home. And June would really need to walk three slices of marble pound cake off.

"Good night, Uncle Roger!" Julia, the youngest of the Cuddy sisters, piped in. She was thinking of New Kids on the Block and a new show to watch. Uncle Roger and Junie really needed to go home, really.

"Good night, Mr. Bateman." Lisa, the eldest, said cryptically. She was thinking, not of Uncle Roger, but of Uncle Roger's lips. Roger and June needed to go home, really, before her mind explodes.

And they did go home afterwards. Lisa was grateful. It certainly was a _long_ dinner with the Batemans. It was certainly a long dinner playing footsie with one Bateman. It was certainly a long dinner making sure that she was playing footsie with the correct Bateman. It was certainly a long dinner making sure that no Cuddy became suspicious that she was attempting to play footsie with the correct Bateman.

Having done her evening rituals of schoolwork, a bath, an argument with her mom, a near-fight with Julia, and a daily father-daughter talk with her Daddy, she just needed to be in her room and be alone for a while. She needed to think.

She needed to think about what was really going on between her and _Uncle_ Roger. She always had a crush on him, but she never really thought it was possible for her to be on intimate terms with the man until his wife left him and June a year ago. After that, she never failed to bring him her mother's muffin baskets every other Sunday, or volunteer to help him check exams, or anything to cheer him up—with her family's consent, of course.

At first, it was innocent. As with other illicit liaisons. Being a tenured university professor, Roger Bateman became somewhat of a mentor to Lisa Cuddy, coaching her with college prep and admissions. He also fostered her interest with literature (specifically, Modern European literature, which he taught) through teaching sessions, conversations, and impromptu book reports. But as with other illicit liaisons, the inevitable occurred.

One night, with sickly June in bed and Arlene Cuddy signature muffins eaten, Roger Bateman found himself looking at his daughter's best friend as if it was his first time. It was quite true. He looked at her as a man, and not as Uncle Roger. Not that he didn't know about Lisa's…_affection_ for him. He was no stranger to lingering looks and inappropriate propositions from the attractive female student body of the university, including female professors. But he never took them seriously. He now understood the thrill of the forbidden with her. Here was Lisa Cuddy, short from offering herself to him, and here he was: a wife he was estranged from, a daughter he did not have anything in common with. Here she was. And all he had to do was return her affections with a single, longing look. He wasn't quite sure if he wanted her to catch him in the act or not. He wasn't quite sure if he was simply wanting a mate after a long time without one, physically and emotionally.

It didn't change the fact that she caught him staring at her that night. For her, that changed _everything_. Lisa had enough sense to make everything with _Uncle_ Roger as friendly as possible. She knew how to separate fantasy from reality, even if that was quite a feat at times. She hoped that she wasn't being too obvious as a love-struck teenager, and she really did behave herself. She became involved with Dostoevsky, Flaubert, Kafka, and Zola, but never with Uncle Roger. She took his advice on college applications and focused on her studies. She genuinely wanted to help him, along with her family (emphasis on the along with: weekly dinners, sports, travel, visits at their homes), after his wife left him. Even if that included one-on-one settings, she knew that her intentions were _quite_ pure. But he looked at her that night—with desire and thankfulness and admiration. And she caught him staring, and she knew that she was not making this up. Not this time.

She was conflicted the day after. What would she tell him? How would she act? She wanted, so badly, to confirm her suspicions of that one night. And she got her wish. She noticed how he became more open after That Night. He told her stories of his youth, of his glories and his failures. He found in her a vessel for teaching and molding. And the more she became Woman to him, the more he wanted her. It was there in shared glances and brushes of the arm. It was there in shaky breaths and sweaty palms. Sometimes, he asked for more teaching 'sessions'. Sometimes, she asked for more books to read and more mini-lectures on Lukacs and Modernism in literary theory. It was a smokescreen for their type of wooing.

Time became what it was. Lisa Cuddy was nearly a high school valedictorian but months shy from sixteen. For her last assignment, Roger asked her to read "Sentimental Education" by Gustave Flaubert. He wanted to test the waters, to see if she could even get his proposal. She wanted signs, to see if he could make the first (or in this case, second) move. By this time, Cal and Arlene Cuddy were comfortable at having Lisa at Roger's place. June was… Well, June was June.

But Lisa Cuddy solved the puzzle. He was trying to replicate forbidden romance; he was making Flaubert alive. And she accepted. In his study one summer night, she accepted.

"Here's my paper," she told him quietly, handing him six pages of a college book report she worked on meticulously for three nights. The light was meager in his room, where stacks of books were piled inside. "I hope you… Thank you." She looked at him earnestly, arms outstretched. They grazed each others' fingers, as the report slid from a pair of hands to another. Lisa blushed.

"What were you really going to say, hmm?" he asked her, crossing his arms. His shirtsleeves were rolled up and he hadn't his tie on. A modern Rhett Butler. She was wearing a white button-down polo and khaki Capri pants. A kid, she was.

"I just wanted to thank you for the lessons. And for my college applications. I'd never have thought I'd be reading Proust before college, let alone listen to free Lit lectures."

"Don't worry, Lissie," he called her _Lissie_, his special nickname for her. It was supposed to be sweet and reassuring. "Arlene's cupcakes and her dinners, plus golf with your dad? It's just too much. Your family has helped me a lot. It's been… taxing without Mona. I should thank you."

He surprised her by holding her hand. She surprised him by kissing him full on the mouth.

Even a desk with heaps of books on it couldn't stop them.


	2. Pro and Contra

**Author's Note: **I think I over-analyzed writing this chapter, that's why it took me so long. It's very difficult writing a character who hasn't been as exposed as House was in the show. Anyway, I thank you for reading the fic. :)

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**Part II: Pro and Contra**

Lisa Cuddy wanted someone to convince her why she shouldn't _do it_ with Roger Bateman.

It wasn't like she didn't want it to happen. Morally, she was opposed to it. She had to be. She knew it was wrong and _so very wrong_ at that; but she was ambivalent. And she knew that she was probably rationalizing her (actually, their actions) imminent actions, but she was desperate. It wasn't exactly reasoning in the _pro_ and _contra_ way of analysis, but there were certain facts she had to consider.

For one, she would potentially be with a man at least twenty-five years her senior. The man could practically be her _father_. But surely, it wasn't the time to think about her father in the bathtub. Surely, her father was not the person she wanted to think about right now when her finger was lightly circling her clit. She was more interested in Roger. _Roger_, she chuckled. _Not Uncle Roger_, she gasped, as she began stroking her labia. Thinking back to Ancient Greece, she was merely going back to the roots of societal framework and practice. Thinking back to how he kissed her, she gasped as she touched herself.

"Mom! Lisa's taking a long time in the bathroom again!" Julia suddenly yelled from outside, interrupting her me-time. If she was going to be like this, Lisa thought, she'd never want to come out.

"Mom! Julia went out with Matthew Decker last night!" she shouted back, not willing to be outwitted by her younger sister. Sometimes, she was the most annoying person in the world, next to her mother. She wondered how it would feel to strangle Julia slowly or smother her with a pillow…slowly.

Lisa heard a screech that was part banshee and part hyena and chuckled in the bathtub. Then she groaned. How can you stay in the mood when you're constantly disturbed like this? She heaved a sigh and laid her head back on the edge of the tub. At least it gave her more time to think about The Situation At Hand.

"Just get out of the bathroom, Lisa!" Julia was relentless.

"Stop stealing my clothes without asking permission! Some part of me thinks that you're a teensy bit too big for them, Julie." she told Julia condescendingly.

She heard another scream from her sister and her feet stamping in the hallway. _Finally._ Apparently, she'd hit a nerve. Julia wasn't _fat_, exactly; she was just big-boned and homely (according to her mother, who was usually blunt about these things). Thank god for her weight issues or arguing with Julia wouldn't stop.

Unfortunately, she was left frustrated. No matter, she thought. It was time to think about The Situation at Hand rationally, without the element of her fingering herself.

And the situation at hand was that a brilliant, brilliant man—an extremely well-respected professor of Literature; a handsome devil to boot; a technically married man with a miserable daughter, wanted her. And she wanted him to want her. She had desperately wanted him to want her. But for some strange reason, a few things stopped her from being too willing; too ready to give in.

There was June Bateman, Uncle Roger's daughter and family friend, for whom the word 'dumpy' would be considered appropriate. She had this strange habit of being annoying even without her doing anything. What would be weird about The Situation at Hand was that she would be potentially sleeping with another man who had a daughter who was the same age as she was. It was certainly taboo in most states. And some countries. And most continents. And in modern society. But wasn't it time to shake things up…a little? Or _much_?

There was the fact that she was a virgin, and that if she slept with Roger Bateman, he would be her first. Would there be heartbreak and recriminations? Possibly. Scratch that. Of course. Of course, there would be. Would there be strings attached? The suburbs were a strange place. Their relationship was a strange one, too. Would they do it in a motel? The master bedroom of the Bateman house? Somehow, Lisa didn't quite think this factor through. After all, there were more important factors she had to mull over: her own sense of what was right, her father, and what her mother would think.

So she was Jewish. Should that make a difference? In her mind, it _should_. It definitely should. Tradition, propriety, the sense of making a transgression? She took those all into account. She never really considered the _What Would Jesus Do?_ slogan because she certainly didn't believe in the New Testament. And if she considered sacred scripture to be her guide, she would look at Moses (who slept with a slave younger than he was) or Jacob (who slept with sisters Leah and Rachel) or Noah, who was a drunk. There were really no good examples of virtue in the Holy Scripture, she thought. She didn't covet another woman's husband, as per The Ten Commandments, because that woman was literally and metaphorically gone (but _goddamn it_, she wasn't divorced from him yet). He didn't covet her because really, she wasn't serious with David Colburn and of course, she wasn't even _married_, for Christ's sakes and no pun intended.

The _Factor_, the imperative component Lisa Cuddy could never cross out of her list, was the undeniable fact that Roger Bateman was Caleb Cuddy's best friend. Simple as that. Somewhere, there was a Catch-22 here. Lisa Cuddy could not just overlook best friendship with daughters, sex, and marriage (yes, marriage) included. She loved her father. She didn't know (or she had an inkling) how devastated he would be if he found out that his best friend of twenty years technically raped his _willing_, eldest daughter. But Lisa could explain. She could explain how that wouldn't really make a difference in the dynamic of the two families. Cuddy-Bateman. Bateman-Cuddy. It sounded perfect. But Cal Cuddy might have a stroke once he found out. He might punch Roger's perfect, chiseled face. She might never see him again. She might always seem _tainted_, so_ dirty_ to her father. He might never look at her in the same light again.

What she also cared about was _What Her Mother Would Think,_ trademark and copyright. Julia was already the perfect child in her eyes, despite her mother's standards. She would think of, and call her daughter, a perfect little harlot if she found out. And that repulsed her. It wasn't being a whore. It was being called a whore by her mother. And Arlene would always remind Lisa of that. That is, if she found out.

_If they found out_. That was the issue here.

She tried crying once, in her room. She put on her favorite Joni Mitchell Record (_Blue_, 1973 from Reprise) and looked out the window. She wanted to express her Inner Turmoil by listening to sad love songs and staring at the suburban landscape before her. In the end, because she couldn't weep in anguish (like most girls) or write a decent poem (like a handful), because singing to Joni Mitchell songs was impossible (not without Julia whining in her room), because in truth she decided upon doing it (she was Lisa Cuddy, after all), she simply decided to eat ice cream in bed instead.

_Fuck it. Fuck it_, she thought.

For once, she tried to be less than rational in her life.


End file.
